Royal Marines Break Geneva Convention

A recording of the moments a Royal Marine allegedly "executed" a captured Afghan national has been released by a military court. Three men - known only as marines A, B and C - are appearing before a court martial charged with killing the unknown person on or around September 15 2011 while on patrol in Afghanistan. They deny the charges. A gunshot is heard on the newly-released audio recording shortly before Marine A is heard saying: "Shuffle off this mortal coil, you ****." He is then heard saying: "Obviously this doesn't go anywhere fellas ... I've just broken the Geneva Convention." A panel at the court martial in Bulford, Wiltshire, has retired to consider their verdicts in the case, after two weeks of evidence. The whole event was filmed by a camera mounted on the helmet of one of the three commandos. Judge Advocate General Jeff Blackett has ruled the graphic video footage cannot be released, but has agreed that the audio can be made public. Referring to the video footage, he said: "Its release may be for proper journalistic purposes ... but would also be used for sensationalist purposes by others and propaganda purposes by terrorist groups. More importantly its release will increase the threat of harm to British service personnel. "I am not prepared to make an order which may lead to the injury or death of a single member of the British armed forces and in making this decision I have erred on the side of safety." During the trial, court martial heard the insurgent had been shot at with 139 30mm anti-tank rounds but was still alive - albeit seriously injured - when discovered by the patrol. The footage, which was shown to the court, shows Marine A i walking forward, bending down, and shooting the man at close range in the centre of his chest with a 9mm pistol. Giving evidence to the court martial, Marine A insisted he believed the insurgent was dead at the time and he was simply shooting into a corpse in anger.